1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a driving support system.
2. Description of Related Art
There is known an existing driving support system that supports driving in consideration of an object that appears from a blind area at the time of entering an intersection, or the like. For example, a driving support system described in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2006-260217 (JP 2006-260217 A) predicts a travel direction of a host vehicle, recognizes a blind area for a driver in the travel direction of the host vehicle, predicts an object that appears from the blind area, detects a movable range of the object, determines that there is a likelihood of collision when the movable range overlaps with the predicted travel direction of the host vehicle, and supports driving so as to avoid the collision.
However, the existing driving support system supports driving by utilizing the predicted travel direction of the host vehicle. Thus, the existing driving support system is configured to avoid a collision by determining whether there occurs a collision in the case where the host vehicle travels in accordance with a currently predicted travel direction, and is not able to compute how much the speed is decreased to avoid a collision, how much avoidance operation is conducted to avoid a collision, or the like. In addition, determination as to a collision, which is made by the existing driving support system, significantly depends on the accuracy of prediction of a future position of the host vehicle. Thus, when the accuracy of prediction is low (for example, when the host vehicle is accelerating, decelerating or being steered), the accuracy of determination as to a collision may decrease. In this case, the existing driving support system supports driving unnecessarily or does not support driving at necessary timing, with the result that a driver may experience a feeling of strangeness.